The 1900 pamphlet, ‘Fabianism and the Empire’, edited by George Bernard Shaw, embraced this imperialist role, arguing that a ‘Great Power’ like the United Kingdom, must ‘govern in the interests of civilization as a whole’. … In contrast to the neoliberals, the Fabians measured civilisation not by the extent of the division of labour, but by labour regulations and living standards; ‘no flag that does not carry a reasonable standard of life with it shall be the flag of a Great Power’, Shaw wrote. … For the neoliberals, the support of the Fabians for the Boer War was evidence that socialism and imperialism shared what Röpke called a ‘common ideological breeding ground’.

Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, loc. 243